Greetings and the best to you in this holiday season. The year of 1999 is nearly done. I have recently returned from the Entomological Society of America (ESA) meeting held this year just "up the road" in Atlanta, GA. The ESA meeting also hosts an abbreviated winter meeting of the North American Dipterists' Society. It is always stimulating to meet and visit with fellow scientists from the USA and Canada at these meetings.

    Thanks for your continued cooperation, our CIE is now on the WWW and available from any site connected to the Web. The URL for our Ceratopogonidae site is:

                http://www2.gasou.edu/facstaff/hagan/cie.html

    Also on our Ceratopogonidae Web site as you may be aware, there is maintained a listing of the mailing list of the CIE and or all ceratopogonid workers worldwide. Included are your e-mail address, voice and fax phone numbers. This is maintained as a service, if you would like to update your listing, please send me an e-mail, fax or letter.

    As with most technological things, this summer (August 1999) I managed to save an old set of addresses over the "newer" set of addresses, so if you find that your address is not current or reverted to the old address - I done bad and I'm sorry!! Mea culpa, I'm guilty. Please keep those addresses, snail and e-mail coming in, I'll be more careful to archive the old version and make the new ones readable on our site.
                                                                                    Best regards to all,

                                                                                    Daniel V. Hagan, Ph.D.
Summary of CIE Contents:
Announcements of Meetings ......................................... 2
Contributions from Cerat. Scientists .............................. 2
Recent Literature on Ceratopogonidae .......................... 6

For all CIE Participants, please send your e-mail address to dhagan@GaSoU.edu.

or Contact: Dr. Manjur Chowdhury (e-mail:alpha@dhaka.agni.com)
    Manjur A. Chowdhury, Ph.D.             Phones: +880-2-9881832 / 9881098
    General Secretary                                             +880-11-851998 / 805419
    Zoological Society of Bangladesh                      +880-2-9661920 Ext. 6060
    C/O. Department of Zoology
    University of Dhaka
    Dhaka - 1000, Bangladesh

    I wish to request, if possible, a little help, through the Ceratopogonid Newsletter:
After several tentatives, we failed to retrieve the following bibliographic document:
    Fox, I. 1958. Nomenclatural and bibliographic notes on American blood sucking midges of Culicoides. Proceedings Tenth International Congress of Entomology, 1:137-142.

    Please extend this request to our ceratopogonid colleagues, through next CIE, perhaps some colleague might be able to hand in it to me by mail, to the following address:
    Mr. Saulo de Jesus Soria, Research Entomologist
    Coleçao Entomologica, Departamento de Entomologia
    Instituto Oswaldo Cruz, IOC/FIOCRUZ
    Avenida Brasil, 4365, Manguinhos
    Caixa Postal 926
    21045.900 Rio de Janeiro, RJ, BRAZIL

Many thanks, in advance, for your generous help,
    Saulo de Jesus Soria

    Not much to report on no-see-ums from Simon Fraser University (near Vancouver, Canada), since Gail Anderson switched careers to Forensic Entomology. She is a faculty member in the Criminology department and now works on maggots from crime scenes, rather than horses with "sweet itch" (Culicoides hypersensitivity).
    Bernie Roitberg is working with models of disease transmission, and others in his lab include Bill Friend, a visiting Emeritus Prof and expert on blood feeding among other things; Rob Anderson, a well-traveled Post Doc. rearing Anopheles, modeling malaria transmission, and collecting ticks and there are several graduate students working with biting flies.
    I retired a few years ago but still field most of the "pest questions" that reach our department and do a little research on sound production and reception in mosquitoes and midges - I'd appreciate feedback from anyone on our CIE list interested in swarming and sounds of Ceratopogonids.
    I discovered these interesting insects (rather, they discovered me) at the Rossdhu field station on Loch Lomond when I was a graduate student in Glasgow. The rumor is that J. Anthony Downes left Glasgow for Canada shortly after the midges there discovered him and I followed his example.
    Sorry I can't contribute much more than this.
    Peter Belton <belton@sfu.ca>
        Peter Belton                                                     Phone: 604 291 4106
        Biological Sciences, Simon Fraser University     Fax: 604 291 3496 attn Belton
        Burnaby BC V5A 1S6
        CANADA

    Our 3-year EU-funded Culicoides adventure came to an end this September 1999. There were a number of participants that included the Pirbright and Compton Institutes (Philip Mellor, Matthew Baylis and Peter Rawlings); the Univ. of Aberdeen (Yvonne-Marie Linton and Bill and Jenny Mordue); the Univ. of Pavia, Italy (Giuliano Gasperi, Federico Sebastiani and Ludwig Gomulski); the Biomedical Research & Training Institute, Zimbabwe (Godfrey Musuka, Pat Kelly); the Veterinary Epidemiology & Economics Unit, Gaborone, Botswana (Patrick Kgori, Sethswano Mogweetsinyane ((get your tongues around that one)), Tuli Lusho and Lindsey Tyler), and finally, the Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute (Karien Labuschagne, Ina Hermanides, Janusz Paweska, Gert Venter and myself).
    Didn't realise that would take half a page...Our principle objectives were:
    1. Via mtDNA extraction and RAPD-PCR establish whether the 7 putative African members of the Imicola complex were distinct genetic entities (i.e. 'good species'). My task was to supply morphologically identified, freshly collected, field material to the Italian and Scottish partners. I am relieved/pleased to say that their results wholly supported the morphological identifications, and furthermore, that not one of the specimens selected on morphology appeared to have been misidentified. So there IS hope for classical taxonomy! But where there WAS a little conflict was in the area of relationships between the taxa. On morphological grounds 8 of the 10 currently known Imicola complex taxa fall into 4 neat species-pairs. However, the mtDNA studies mixed them up a bit. One of the more surprising 'mixes' was that a new species, (dubbed C. sp # 107 and which breeds in zebra dung) emerged as the taxon most closely related to C. imicola. If we recall that zebras naturally cycle the virus of African horse sickness (AHS), and that imicola is the principal vector of this equine disease, then the discovery of a new zebra-dung-breeding-imicola-like taxon has interesting vector implications. However, C. sp # 107 is a rare beast with a most unusual phenology...this will be described one day soon!

    2. Another objective was to measure the vector competence of some of the above sibling species, and other Culicoides, by feeding them in the laboratory on virus-infected blood and assaying them for virus replication 10 days later. The viruses chosen were bluetongue (BT), AHS and equine encephalosis (EE). Here too surprising results were achieved. One of the most notable was that the cattle-dung inhabiting C. bolitinos appears to be a far better vector than C. imicola of certain BT serotypes. Most species outside the Imicola complex tested negative. These studies have been partly reported upon (Venter et al 1998, Med. & Vet. Ent., 12, 378 - 385; Paweska & Venter 1999, Proc. 12th Ent Cong., South Africa).

    3. One of the most ambitious work packages on the programme was elucidating, in time and space, the distribution of all Culicoides species in South Africa (40 light-trap sites), Zimbabwe (6) and eastern Botswana (3). The sites were chosen in proximity to Automatic Weather Stations so that risk models on certain vector species could be developed using various climatic factors in combination with satellite imagery. The traps were run weekly by recruited landowners who were paid for their efforts. I believe this contributed to the remarkable 80% return rate; close to 5,000
collections were made in the field. EACH catch was estimated as to size and subsampled; all Culicoides were then identified, sexed and age-graded in each subsample. All the data have found their way into a specially written database, and the first rough distribution maps already produced. At the end of the day the seasonal and geographic distribution of 90 of South Africa's 120 Culicoides species has been unravelled. The Bull. Ent. Soc says they will publish it...but for 8,000 pounds sterling! (Any readers wishing to make a donation please contact...) One of the neater
things to emerge is that C. imicola is entirely absent from certain locales, and so makes such sites suitable for disease-free export, quarantining, etc. This is especially promising for a country such as South Africa which is designated as 'endemic' for many orbiviral diseases, which can create the erroneous perception that we are simply unable to export safely.
    One of the most serendipitous (and satisfying) discoveries made during the program was uncovering a link between warm-phase El Nino events and large epizootics of AHS. Indeed, since 1819, South Africa has recorded 14 large outbreaks of AHS; 13 are now known to have occurred during El Nino events. These are characterised by 3 months of drought followed by 3 months of above-average rainfall. This 'dry-wet' pattern was already documented by a certain T. Paton in 1863: "there are seasons (usually wet ones) succeeding drought, in which great mortality occurs among horses at the fall of the year". It is interesting to note that a similar pattern was evoked as characterising the recent American outbreak of equine encephalitis roundabout New York.
    We now know that C. imicola numbers can increase 200-fold during rainy periods and that 1,000,000 adults can be caught in a single light-trap, and that 99% of these will be blood-thirsty females! At such times unvaccinated horses stand little chance of avoiding a virus being disseminated so efficiently.
    A last word: I would like to express my appreciation to all collaborators on the above mentioned EU program. We had tons of fun and an absolute minimum of hassles. It just worked!
                kind regards,
                Rudy Meiswinkel

    Prof. Rudy Meiswinkel                                 e-mail: rudy@moon.ovi.ac.za
    Depts. of Entomology/ Biochemistry             Phone: 012-529-9177
    Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute                 Fax: 012-565-6573
    Onderstepoort 0110
    REPUBLIC of SOUTH AFRICA

        Dr. Yehuda Braverman, Department of Parasitology, Kimron Veterinary Institute, Bet Dagan, ISRAEL presented a seminar on June 24, 1999 to the faculty, staff, graduate and undergraduate students of the Biology Department at Georgia Southern University, Statesboro, GA USA. The title of the seminar was: "Studies of Insect Vectors Transmitting Diseases in Israel."
        The seminar was sponsored by the Biology Department and the GSU Chapter of Sigma Xi, the Scientific Research Society.

    In the course my review of the current literature (and I confess that I also have an affection for the Acari), I ran across this rather interesting article by D.E. Walter in which he describes a mite collected from a Culicoides sp.:
    The article is entitled: "Review of Australian Asperoseius Chant, Euseius Wainstein, Okiseius Ehara and Phytoscutus Muma (Acari: Mesostigmata: Phytoseiidae) with a key to the genera of Australian Amblyseiinae and descriptions of two new species." The article appears in: Australian Journal of Entomology [Aust. J. Entomol.], 38 (2): 85-95, 4 May 1999

    A summary of the Abstract:   Previous workers have used a conservative generic classification of the subfamily Amblyseiinae that treated most Australian Phytoseiidae as species in the genus Amblyseius Berlese. However, this lumping masks the occurrence of a number of genera recognised overseas, including some that contain important biological control agents. In this review, a key to the genera of Australian Amblyseiinae is provided and the Australian species in four amblyseiinae genera are reviewed and keyed. Asperoseius Chant is represented by a single known Australian species, A. australiensis Fain and Krantz collected from a Culicoides midge in South Australia.

        D.E.Walter                                                     e-mail: D.Walter@mailbox.uq.edu.au
        Department of Zoology and Entomology,
        The University of Queensland,
        Qld 4072, AUSTRALIA

Carbone, J., W. Keller, and R.W. Griffiths. 1999. Effects of changes in acidity on aquatic insects in rocky littoral habitats of lakes near Sudbury, Ontario. Restoration Ecology 6: 376-389.

Cribb, B.W. and E. Chitra. 1998. Ultrastructure of the eggs of Culicoides molestus (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae). Journal of the American Mosquito Control Association 14: 363-368.

Filimonova, S.A. and N.K. Brodskaya. 1998. Ultrastructural investigation of the oogenesis in bloodsucking biting midges of the genus Culicoides Latr. (Diptera, Ceratopogonidae). Entomological Review C/C of Entomologicheskoe Obozrenie 78: 808-821.

Fu, H., C.J. Leake, P.P. Mertens, and P.S. Mellor. 1999. The barriers to bluetongue virus infection, dissemination and transmission in the vector, Culicoides variipennis (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae). Archives of Virology 144: 747-761.

Glukhova, V.M. and Y. Braverman. 1999. Review of the palearctic desert biting midges Culicoides langeroni group, with a description of a new species (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae). Journal of Medical Entomology 36: 309-312.

Kline, D.L. and R.C. Axtell. 1999. Sensilla of the antennae and maxillary palps of Culicoides hollensis and C. melleus (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae). Journal of Medical Entomology 36: 493-502.

Mullens, B.A., R.K. Velten, and B.A. Federici. 1999. Iridescent virus infection in Culicoides variipennis sonorensis and interactions with the mermithid parasite Heleidomermis magnapapula. Journal of Invertebrate Pathology 73: 231-233.

Mushi, E.Z., R.G. Chabo, J.F.W. Isa, M.G. Binta, R.W. Kapaata, and T. Bathuseng. 1999. Culicoides spp. (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae) associated with farmed ostriches (Struthio camelus) in Botswana. Veterinary Research Communications 23: 183-186.

Nunamaker, R.A., S.E. Brown, and D.L. Knudson. 1999. Fluorescence in situ hybridization landmarks for chromosomes of Culicoides variipennis (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae). Journal of Medical Entomology 36: 171-175.

Ortega, M.D., F.R. Holbrook, and J.E. Lloyd. 1999. Seasonal distribution and relationship to temperature and precipitation of the most abundant species of Culicoides in five provinces of Andalusia, Spain. Journal of the American Mosquito Control Association 15: 391-399.

Poepperl, R. 1999. Emergence pattern of Diptera in various sections of a Northern German lowland stream. Limnologica Jena 29: 128-136.

Ronderos, M.M. and G.R. Spinelli. 1999. On the subgenus Forcipomyia (Lasiohelea) in the Neotropical region (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae). Transactions of the American Entomological Society 125: 151-161.

Stewart, R.G. and D.L. Kline. 1999. Sugar feeding by Culicoides mississippiensis (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae) on the yaupon holly, Ilex vomitoria. Journal of Medical Entomology 36: 268-271.

Stuart, A.E. and C.L.E Stuart. 1998. A microscope slide test for the evaluation of insect repellents as used with Culicoides impunctatus. Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata 89: 277-280.

Walter, D.E. 1999. Review of Australian Asperoseius Chant, Euseius Wainstein, Okiseius Ehara and Phytoscutus Muma (Acari: Mesostigmata: Phytoseiidae) with a key to the genera of Australian Amblyseiinae and descriptions of two new species. Australian Journal of Entomology 38: 85-95.